


Pride

by hondansadeensommar



Series: Multifandom Hurt/Comfort Oneshots [10]
Category: Produce 101 (TV)
Genre: Adoption, Child Abandonment, Dyslexia, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Learning Disabilities, Lee Dongwook is the best National Producer Representative ever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-28
Updated: 2019-06-28
Packaged: 2020-05-28 07:42:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,861
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19389583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hondansadeensommar/pseuds/hondansadeensommar
Summary: “I think that she has more to be proud of than you realize."





	Pride

“ _Yah_ … how do you not know the words, Hangyul- _ssi_?”

Hangyul couldn’t help feeling sick at the question, bowing quickly to Shin Yoomi, who was obviously annoyed by the fact that he had screwed up the words to the new song multiple times.“ _Mianheyo_ ,” he replied, not looking up at the woman.

“What have you been doing, that you aren’t prepared?You won’t pass the concept evaluations if you can’t even learn the words to a new song,” Yoomi replied.

“I…”Hangyul took a deep breath, trying to calm down so that his voice wouldn’t shake as he attempted to answer the woman’s question.He could feel his heart racing as he tried to come up with any answer other than the truth.“I don’t have an excuse,” he lied, looking down at the floor.“ _Mianheyo_ … I’ll work harder.”

Hangyul could feel tears beginning to sting at his eyes as the trainer sighed.“At least you own up to your mistake.Look over the words while I work with the others, we’ll come back if we have time.”Hangyul nodded, bowing at the woman as he pulled out the lyrics to look over them again, even though he knew that it wouldn’t do him any good.Hangyul _had_ been working on the lyrics almost non-stop since the group had split the parts; his brain just couldn’t wrap itself around the words, and for the first time Hangyul didn’t really feel comfortable asking for help given just how much stress everyone was under.All of the other members of his group had their own issues to worry about, and Hangyul couldn’t help feeling like he was too much of a burden for them whenever he contemplated asking for help.

It was easy when he was performing well-known songs; he could listen to the lyrics over and over again until they stuck in his brain, and usually he already knew them to at least some degree.In the past, he’d had really good guide tracks and other people he could trust to help him grasp the words for new songs.But their guide track wasn’t quite what Hangyul was used to having, and he really didn’t feel as though he _could_ talk to his group members about why he was struggling with the words.No one had even noticed during the first major evaluation stages, because Hangyul had been able to rely on other things to get him through.

Hangyul was thankful when the training session ended without time for Yoomi to come back to him; even though he knew the reason for his struggle, he really didn’t want to expose that particular part of his story to the world.It was enough that everyone knew he had been abandoned as a child; he didn’t want to put all of his wounds on display for the world to see.“Hangyul- _ssi_ … come talk with me,” Yoomi commented, motioning for Hangyul to move closer to the keyboard as the rest of the group left the room.The woman waited until the other trainees were out of the room, before she turned to Hangyul with a sigh.“This isn’t like you, Hangyul- _ssi_.You’re usually better at being prepared for class.”

“ _Mianheyo_ …” Hangyul began, bowing to the woman.

“I don’t want you to apologize… I want to know what’s really going on here,” Yoomi replied.“The medication they put you on, is it making things more difficult?”Hangyul looked up quickly at the question, surprised that the vocal trainer knew anything about the antidepressants he’d been given.The production staff had obviously been told so that they could make sure he was okay, but Hangyul had been told that it was up to him whether he wanted anyone else to know.He hadn’t realized that the trainers had been included in the members of staff that would need to know of his condition.“The trainers were made aware of the situation so that we could keep an eye on you, because of the potential side effects of your medication.It isn’t being put into the show unless you choose to talk about it when given the opportunity, but the producers don’t want to risk allowing the situation to get out of hand…”

Hangyul took a deep breath, nodding at the words.“I understand… I’m sorry for worrying everyone…”

“Please, stop apologizing, Hangyul- _ssi_ ,” Yoomi replied.“Just… tell me what’s going on.This really isn’t what I would have expected from you, especially considering how well you’ve been doing…”

“I… I can’t read well,” Hangyul replied softly, not looking up.“Before now, I’ve always had help with the words… either I’ve been able to listen to the songs over and over again, or I’ve had someone I trusted to ask for help.This time, I haven’t felt right asking for help, when everyone has so many things they’re struggling with…”

There was a long silence, before Hangyul felt the woman take his hand.“You didn’t learn to read in elementary school?”

“I tried… really, I did.But the words just got confused and didn’t make sense,” Hangyul replied.“I’m dyslexic… we didn’t figure it out until I was in middle school, because I figured out how to hide that I was struggling.I didn’t ever do _well_ in school, but I could fake my way through well enough to get by… just well enough so that no one suspected I might have a learning disability until I was too old to really catch up…”

“And you’ve been hiding that all this time?” Yoomi asked.Hangyul nodded slowly, still not looking up at the woman.“Right… I have a break for the next hour, before I see my next team.Let’s see if we can’t get these words right.”

Hangyul looked up, confused.“You want to help me?” he asked, confused.

Yoomi smiled at him.“It isn’t your fault that you have trouble reading,” she replied.“You just need a helping hand, right?”Hangyul nodded, letting the trainer take his lyrics and set them down on top of her keyboard.“We’ll go line by line, okay?”

Hangyul nodded sitting down when the trainer offered him a seat and letting her guide him through the words of his part until the words slowly began to come together and make sense in his brain.It took most of the hour for Hangyul to have the words right, but he was feeling much more confident by the time Yoomi handed him his lyrics back.“Thank you, Yoomi- _ssi_ … I appreciate your help.”

“Don’t be afraid to ask for help, Hangyul- _ssi_ ,” Yoomi replied, reaching up to squeeze his shoulder.“You should go catch up with the rest of your group.”

“Thank you again, Yoomi- _ssi_ ,” Hangyul replied, smiling and bowing at the woman before he turned to leave the room.

Hangyul was surprised to find the rest of his group sitting around with boxes of chicken sitting open around them when he arrived in their rehearsal room.“Hangyul- _ah_!Lee Dongwook- _ssi_ brought us snacks!” one of his teammates called, as he walked into the room.

“You haven’t been off moping about being scolded, have you, Hangyul- _hyung_?”

Hangyul forced a smile, shaking his head.“I’ve been working on the lyrics… I think I’ve finally got them down,” he replied.Hangyul could see a production assistant talking to Dongwook off in the corner as he sat down, smiling as one of his teammates passed him an open box of chicken so that he could eat, too.

“Hangyul- _ssi_ … can we talk for a few minutes?”Hangyul was pulled out of the conversation with his group members by the sound of Dongwook’s voice calling his name.Hangyul nodded, getting up and following the older man out into the hallway, where Dongwook motioned for him to sit down with him on a bench near the entrance to the practice room.“I hear that you’ve been having a rough time lately…”

Hangyul looked down at his knees, taking a deep breath.He was well aware that there were cameras watching them, and he knew that there was a good chance that whatever he said was going to end up on-air.Hangyul knew that he had to be careful about what he said.“It’s… none of this is easy,” Hangyul replied.

“Nothing about this life is easy… but I know that you know better than most of the other trainees here,” Dongwook replied.“You had a rough start of things, didn’t you?”

Hangyul nodded slowly.“My parents… they adopted me when I was seven,” Hangyul replied.“Before that, I grew up in an orphanage.My parents and my brothers are the best thing that could have ever happened to me, but there are things about being abandoned that love can’t undo…”

“What do you mean?” Dongwook asked.

Hangyul took a deep breath, closing his eyes.“My mother is a social worker… she explained to me when I was younger that being abandoned changes the way your brain works.And even though she and my father and my brothers love me, there are things that can’t fix,” Hangyul replied.“I have a hard time with reading… I was in middle school before we found out that I was dyslexic, and I still struggle because I never really got the help I needed…”

“That’s why you didn’t know your lyrics earlier today?Because you couldn’t read them?” Dongwook asked. 

“It’s that the characters get jumbled up.And there’s no pattern to what gets mixed up, either… it isn’t consistent,” Hangyul replied.“Until someone else reads what’s on the paper, I can’t be sure that what I’m reading is right.Sometimes it turns into a different word, and sometimes it’s just gibberish…”

Hangyul closed his eyes as the older man stroked a hand through his hair.“You’re doing amazingly well, all things considered…” Dongwook began.

“I’m worried that it won’t be enough again…” Hangyul replied.“I’ve debuted before, but the group failed and we all ended up in a completely different company.I’ve done a show like this before, and I missed debuting by four spots… and all I want is to make my family proud, to be successful so that I can pay them back for at least a part of everything they’ve done for me…”

“I’m sure that your parents are proud of the young man you’ve become… so many people would have given up a long time ago,” Dongwook replied.“You’re persevering despite the fact that you have so many things working against you, and you’re still rising through the rankings.Even if you don’t make it through to the final group, I think you’ll still be successful simply because you work so hard.”

Hangyul nodded.“ _Eomma_ always tells me that she’s proud of me, even though I haven’t done anything really worthy of that yet,” he replied.

“I think that she has more to be proud of than you realize,” Dongwook replied.“You’re a strong young man, Hangyul- _ssi_.Not everyone would have stuck it out this long with the challenges you’ve faced.That’s certainly something for your family to be proud of.”


End file.
